Importance

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Abstract

A plurality of elongated articles such as french fried potato strips are aligned with their longitudinal axes substantially parallel and packaged in such aligned condition by the apparatus and method of the invention. The articles are prealigned by a vibrating conveyor having longitudinal partitions dividing it into four tracks, so that the longitudinal axes of such articles are substantially parallel to their direction of travel which forms acute angle of about 45.degree. with the front wall of an alignment container into which the articles are fed. The alignment container is vibrated at a different frequency than the vibrating conveyor in order to settle and to further align the elongated articles with their longitudinal axes substantially parallel to the front wall of such container. One end of the elongated article strikes the front wall of the alignment container and is pushed along such wall by the conveyor into more parallel alignment therewith before falling through the inlet opening of such container. The aligned articles are discharged from the alignment container into a weighing container after reaching a predetermined height, and are then weighed while additional elongated articles are conveyed into such weighing container by a second vibrating conveyor. When a predetermined weight is reached the contents of the weighing container are discharged as a batch into a packaging machine for packaging without disturbing the alignment of such articles. The packages of aligned articles are tipped slowly by a tipping means from a vertical filling position to a horizontal position on an outfeed conveyor.

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First Claim